


Give Me That Old-Fashioned Morphine

by anactoria



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angelic Grace, Angst, Community: hoodie_time, Episode: s10e11 There's No Place Like Home, Episode: s10e12 About A Boy, Episode: s10e13 Halt & Catch Fire, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, M/M, Mark of Cain, Season/Series 10, Violent Thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-17
Updated: 2015-02-17
Packaged: 2018-03-13 12:04:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,547
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3380858
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anactoria/pseuds/anactoria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cas tries to help Dean deal with the Mark of Cain. Problem is, Dean's doing the opposite of dealing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Give Me That Old-Fashioned Morphine

**Author's Note:**

> Squeaking in under the wire, and will no doubt be thoroughly Jossed by the end of the evening. 
> 
> This started life as a response to a [prompt](http://hoodie-time.livejournal.com/954742.html?thread=12438134#t12438134) on the [hoodie_time comment meme](http://hoodie-time.livejournal.com/954742.html), but devolved into a mess of feelings about the last few episodes somewhere along the way.
> 
> Many thanks to [JJ1564](http://archiveofourown.org/users/JJ1564/pseuds/JJ1564) for the super-efficient beta. :)

Dumb, in hindsight, blaming the shakes on the booze.

Dean’s known for a long time that if he was gonna quit drinking for serious, he’d be in worse shape than this. He’s talking punching walls, puking his goddamn _eyes_ out on the bathroom floor, maybe even Sammy calling an ambulance. He knows it, deeper down than even his denial goes. 

Only reason he managed to go a week without a drink was, he had help.

The Mark won’t let him incapacitate himself with withdrawal—with any of the lifetime’s worth of bad habits clamoring for attention inside his head. There are dozens of them, but the Mark shouts loudest, and ‘off with their heads’ trumps ‘drink me’ every time. Who the hell knows how, but it’s kept him functioning somehow; gentled him through the dry days and kept the thirst for blood thrumming hot under his skin.

And now Charlie’s on her way to the airport with her arm in a sling, and Dean’s hands are steady.

He thinks about getting a drink, but he doesn’t. He’d like to think that it’s a way of saying _fuck you_ to the Mark, refusing to give in and feel better when he doesn’t deserve to—but mostly, it’s just that he emptied every bottle he could find down the sink after the Claire shitshow, and the thought of leaving the bunker to find a bar or a liquor store makes that hunger bite a little deeper.

Right now, he doesn’t feel like leaving his room ever again. Dean jams his headphones over his ears so he can plead ignorance if Sam comes knocking at the door to emote at him again, turns out the lamp, and stretches out on top of the bedcovers fully clothed. 

No way he’s gonna sleep, but he closes his eyes anyway. Maybe he can just detach from himself a little while. Drift in a sea of Zeppelin instead of feeling like he’s drowning in hellfire.

The drifting—he can do that. It’s just that, once in a while, he bumps up against things. Images, memories. A fist landing on flesh, solid and satisfying; smooth-worn bone in his hand; the wet sound of the Blade sinking between ribs and twisting. Blood spilling over his fingers, sticky and warm. 

He blinks back to reality and finds that he isn’t shaking. Doesn’t feel like puking. Somehow that makes it worse.

The Mark throbs. Dean turns up the volume and tries to think of nothing.

 

\----

 

He isn’t sure how long he’s been lying there when his iPod playlist runs out. That’s one of the disadvantages of living somewhere without windows—or one of the advantages, depending what kind of a mood he’s in. It’s been long enough that he’s debating whether or not he needs a piss and a coffee badly enough to risk being ambushed by Sam and dragged into a conversation, anyway. 

He rubs at his eyes; registers that somebody’s knocking on his door before he notices his headphones have gone quiet.

Sam can’t even leave him alone for a couple hours. Or a day, or however long it’s been.

 _That’s not the point_ , the Mark whispers inside his head, or maybe the part of his brain that listens to it does. _He doesn’t get it, thinks you need babysitting, thinks you’re a mess. He always did._ The throb of it burns in his veins; his hands are in fists and he has to grit his teeth against the urge to just break something.

Dean swallows, breathes in long and slow. “Dude,” he says, when he’s sure his voice will come out steady. “What?”

The door cracks open, spilling in light from the corridor and making him blink. Then it opens all the way and it’s Cas, not Sam, who walks in.

It’s enough to make Dean squint in surprise, propping himself up on his elbows. Cas stands there in the dark, and Dean can’t see his eyes but he can feel Cas looking at him.

“Sam called me,” Cas says, after a moment.

Dean scowls. “Course he did.” Because the stubborn sonofabitch can’t leave well enough alone, had to go and call Cas, make sure he got to see Dean like this as well. Dean should smash his fucking _face_ in—

He presses the heels of his hands over his eyes. Breathes in. Breathes out.

It isn’t him. Isn’t him that wants to do that. He pulls his hands away but keeps his eyes closed, is suddenly glad that the lights are out. He’s trembling, only it isn’t the shakes. It’s the strain of holding up something that’s too heavy for him, pressing his shoulder to a door to keep it closed when there’s a whole ocean on the other side trying to break it down and come flooding through.

He startles when the mattress dips as Cas sits beside him, breathing in sharp through his teeth. Cas doesn’t react.

After a moment, Dean opens his eyes. 

Cas is turned toward him, the faint light from the corridor picking out the planes of his face, the sorrowful lines etched deep around his mouth and his eyes. Dean can’t see the blue of them, like this, but he can see the way Cas is watching him, intent and unhappy. Cas is sitting a little too close, so their knees almost touch, and once upon a time, Dean would’ve inched away from him with a gripe about personal space.

Now, he holds his breath and sits still. Saying anything would feel too close to acknowledging that there’s something there, something that charges the air between them and tingles under the surface of Dean’s skin. 

Dean can’t do that. Maybe not ever, and definitely not now. 

Cas was angry, when he first found out about the Mark. Dean remembers that. The viselike grip on his arm, the grit in Cas’s voice as he said, _What have you done?_

Maybe it’s fucked up, that Dean kind of wishes he’d get mad again, instead of sitting here all sad-eyed and gentle, same as Sammy does. He doesn’t deserve this, from either of them. 

“Sam told me what happened,” Cas says, then. Slowly, like Dean might lash out or run away from him if he makes any loud noises or sudden moves. “With Charlie.”

Dean looks away. “What, and you’re here to talk me round? Tell me to forgive myself for beating the crap out of the chick who’s—who was practically my kid sister?”

“No.” Cas’s voice has an edge to it, and it makes Dean blink and look back at him. But his eyes are as soft as before, and he sighs. “Don’t misunderstand me, Dean. I would tell you that, if I thought you’d hear it. But arguing with you won’t save you. It won’t get rid of this.” 

Without warning, he places his hand on Dean’s arm, over the Mark. It’s cold, like he’s just come in from outside. He must have just got here. 

He came to see Dean right away, instead of talking it over with Sam first. Dean tries not to let himself be comforted by that. 

There’s something else in the touch, though—a different kind of cold. It isn’t physical, but it kind of hurts, like brain-freeze on the outside. And the Mark—Dean can feel it protest, like it would writhe and wriggle away from Cas’s touch if it could. It uncurls tendrils of revulsion, tickling at the back of his mind, so he has to fight not to shake Cas’s hand off.

( _Shove it off, shove Cas off of the bed and onto the floor, drive a fist into his face—remember what Metadouche said, an angel’s blood on his hands, it’d take him higher than the goddamn_ moon—)

He swallows, digs fingers into his thighs. Looks at Cas’s hand. His face.

“So,” he says. “Why are you here?”

For a moment, Dean thinks he isn’t getting an answer. Then Cas squares his shoulders and says, “I can’t convince you that you deserve to be saved. I understand that.” He pauses. “But maybe I can help you save yourself.”

“How’re you gonna do that? You got the demon tablet stashed in that ugly-ass car of yours? Some shiny new lore book the Men of Letters missed? ‘Cause otherwise—”

“Otherwise what, Dean? I should give up? Leave you to suffer?”

Dean shrugs, looks at his hands.

Cas moves fractionally closer. They’re touching, then, the warm line of Cas’s thigh pressed against Dean’s own. Cas reaches out with his free hand, brushes Dean’s cheek with his thumb. It’s a weirdly tentative gesture, like he’s asking permission. 

Dean should say no. He should get up and leave the room, because whatever Cas is offering him, he can’t take it. The Mark, and the part of him it speaks to—Dean can still hear them whispering in his ear. _Grab his wrist, pull it this way, get him on the floor and put the boot in_. He should run, or he should tell Cas to run.

He doesn’t. He lifts his head, looks Cas in the eyes. Hears himself saying, “What, then? What are you gonna do?” like it’s a plea.

“Just this,” Cas says. He’s close enough that Dean finds himself watching Cas’s mouth shape the words, and for an insane moment, somewhere beneath the anger and the shame and the burn of the Mark, he wonders if Cas is about to kiss him.

Instead, Cas pulls his hand away from Dean’s face. He places it on top of the other one, over the Mark. His face sets in concentration, and then Dean feels a cold pulse of power break into him and steal his breath.

When Dean was seven, Dad worked a case in this shitty little beach town in Cape Cod, and the day after he’d gotten rid of the spirit, he took them down to the beach. Looking back, it was probably a good excuse for him to catch an hour’s shut-eye while they played in the sand, but back then it seemed like Christmas. Dean had never seen the sea before, and he started sprinting the second his feet hit the sand, just ran for the water’s edge and a wave reared up and slapped him onto his back. 

It was icy, made his head spin and his nose and eyes sting from the salt, a sharp ache in his head as he coughed up brine. It took everything else away, just for a moment, before Dad grabbed his hand and hauled him to his feet; left him with nothing but cold, clean pain.

This is a little like that. Only the wave is light, is _Cas_ , and when it recedes Cas is still sitting there, holding Dean’s arm and looking into his face.

It’s Cas’s grace—whatever grace Cas still has, anyway. A little part of Cas inside of him.

And that isn’t something Dean has the capacity to think about in too much detail right now, so he pushes it down and rounds on Cas.

“What the fuck?” he demands. “You can’t do this, man. You’re gonna run out of juice, sooner or later. You can’t just waste it on—on me.” He tries to snatch his arm back, and Cas won’t let go, so he scowls. “What were you thinking?”

Cas just looks at him. “Dean,” he says. “Listen.”

Dean stares at him.

“ _Listen_ ,” he says again, and lets go of Dean’s arm.

Dean’s breath catches, involuntary, as he waits for the hot throb of the Mark to return, for its voice inside his head.

It doesn’t come.

Cas’s face is set. He’s looking at Dean the way he used to, the way he still does, sometimes. Like the hordes of Hell could be dancing the Macarena behind him, and Cas wouldn’t even notice. 

Dean looks at the bolt of his jaw, thinks about pressing his mouth there and not his teeth. He swallows. Sighs and sinks back a little, not exactly leaning against Cas’s shoulder, but almost.

“I’m good,” he says.

Cas gives a little nod and touches his shoulder again. “You’re tired,” he says. “You should sleep.”

He’s right. Dean can feel the exhaustion now, in a way he couldn’t with the Mark snapping its teeth in his mind’s eye. It’s an ache worn deep into his bones.

But his head is clear. He tests himself. Pictures Sam’s face, pictures him calling Cas to tell him all about Dean’s latest fuckup, and finds that his resentment doesn’t tip over into wanting to dig his fingers into Sam’s throat or wanting to punch Cas in the face just for knowing. The Mark aches, but it’s faint, like a burn after it’s been iced.

“No way, man,” he says. “I ain’t gonna waste this. You wanna fix me, you can come help with the research.” He gets to his feet. 

Cas catches his wrist before he makes it out the door. Dean turns to face him and he hesitates.

“Dean,” he says—slow, choosing his words. “I can’t fix you. I know that.” He pauses. “I can’t give up, either. You have to understand. I know you understand.”

Dean closes his eyes. “Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, Cas, I get it.”

He steps out of Cas’s grip and into the corridor, and this time Cas follows without a word.

 

\----

 

They sit and pore over books, drink endless mugs of coffee. Sam disappears and comes back with takeout, sets down a container of noodles and grease in front of Dean without a word.

Dean looks at it. Raises an eyebrow.

Sam crosses his arms. “Dude,” he says, “if I have to spend one more meal listening to you whine about eating your vegetables, I’m gonna stick those chopsticks through my eardrums myself.”

He doesn’t say, _It didn’t work. You know it didn’t work. Nothing you do works._

Maybe Dean could goad him into saying it, if he pushed hard enough, bitched loud enough.

Cas’s foot brushes his under the table. It isn’t a kick, just a nudge. Dean takes a breath. He doesn’t need to push. Doesn’t need Sam to say those things. 

“Thanks, Sammy,” he says, and reaches for the carton.

 

\----

 

Dean reads until his eyes hurt. Then he makes coffee and reads some more. 

Sam gets up, stretches until his spine cracks and announces that he’s going to take a shower or a nap or something. Dean isn’t really listening, concentrating on the latest page of the latest dusty tome until the print swims before his eyes.

He looks up and finds Cas watching him. He’s been sitting there the whole night, not talking much, the silence comfortable in a way it maybe shouldn’t be. 

It’s just that there’s always something. There’s always something, and there isn’t always Cas, and now he’s here acting all patient and rock-steady. Dean can’t rely on his presence. Wouldn’t deserve to, even if he could. But he’s still here, and it feels like a promise.

Cas looks at him for a moment longer, but turns back to his book just as Dean’s opening his mouth to say, _What?_

Dean follows suit. He props his chin on his hands when his eyelids start to droop, but by the time Sam emerges from his bedroom fuck-knows-how-many hours later, Dean’s half-asleep, eyelids scratchy and sore. 

He hasn’t found anything, and neither has Cas, and Dean’s passed through resignation and come out the other side. He pulls his Bic out of his pocket and flicks it, watches the spark jump. Looks at the page and pictures flames licking along its edges.

Sam yawns, rubs at his eyes, then stops dead when he sees Dean still sitting at the table.

Dean glares up at him. “What?”

“You look like hell,” Sam tells him. “Seriously. You should get some shut-eye.”

“Yeah.” Dean drops the lighter onto the tabletop with a clatter. Its corner leaves a tiny dent in the polish. “Ain’t like I’m any use awake.” 

His voice comes out harder than he means it to. He feels a tiny stab of regret, means to apologize, but then Sam sighs and shakes his head and Dean snaps his mouth shut, scowling. There’s something behind his eyes again. A pulse like the beginnings of a migraine, hot and insistent.

_He thinks you’re useless. You could show him you’re not. We could show him._

Dean’s fingers clench. Sammy’s eyes widen. He looks worried, now. Dean can picture his fist knocking that worried look right off Sam’s face, and it’s a hell of a pretty picture, and the page he’s holding trembles in his fingers and he thinks he might be about to puke.

Something touches his hand.

He starts, but it’s only Cas. His fingers close around Dean’s own, and there’s a question on his face.

Dean should say no. Cas’s grace is finite, now. He can’t just keep pouring it into Dean, into the bottomless pit of the Mark. Dean can’t let him do that.

He closes his eyes and red pulses behind their lids. The image of Sam’s face, blood dripping from the corner of his mouth. He opens them again.

“Not here,” he says. His voice comes out hoarse.

Cas nods, gets to his feet, and Dean follows him out the library. For once, Sam ignores all the questions he could be asking, all the puppy-eyed concern he could be radiating, and just mutters, “Not even gonna ask.” 

Dean’s about as grateful as he gets, these days.

 

\----

 

They pass the next three days like that. They research. They eat enough crappy food that by the third afternoon Sam’s making faces at his takeout and talking about scurvy. Dean crashes on the library couch for a couple hours whenever he gets tired, and when he wakes up, Cas is always there.

 _Watching over you_ , Cas would have said, once. Only now he seems to have learned the value of keeping his trap shut sometimes, so instead of announcing it, he just does it.

Most of the time, Dean finds that it doesn’t even bother him. And when it does—well, that means it’s time to take the hand Cas offers him, let him work his mojo until the monster trying to batter its way out of Dean’s skull curls up and goes quiet.

It can’t last. Dean knows that.

On morning number four, he emerges from the bathroom bleary-eyed, his back reminding him that he isn’t twenty anymore and he should probably stop passing out on the couch. The coffee pot is empty, so he picks it up and makes for the kitchen.

When he turns for the door, though, his eyes catch on Cas’s face. 

Cas is sitting at the table, same as he’s been doing all week, a book open in front of him. But he’s looking at his hands, not the page.

The keys to the Continental dangle from his fingers.

He looks up. There’s regret written all over his face—plus something else, something Dean can’t get a read on—but he doesn’t apologize.

Dean sets down the coffee pot, closes his eyes against the ache that’s starting up in his temples. “Were you gonna say anything?” he asks. “Or were you just gonna shoot?”

He hears the scrape of Cas’s chair, the rustle of his coat as he gets to his feet. “Dean—” he begins.

“Don’t.” Dean opens his eyes and glares. “I get it, okay? You’ve wasted enough time and—whatever—on me. You got stuff to do. Angel stuff.”

Cas’s eyes harden. “Not _angel stuff_.”

“Then what, Cas?”

Cas sighs. “We’re finding nothing, here. Maybe I’ll find something out there. Someone who can help us.”

It takes Dean a moment to catch on. He looks at Cas, and then his gaze falls to the book Cas had open in front of him on the table. It isn’t a lore book, just a moldy old Bible, open on Genesis 4. 

The look in Cas’s eyes. It’s just like Sammy, back in that last year before Hell. The determination in it. How tired it makes Dean feel.

“You’re gonna go looking for Cain?” he says. “Yeah, well, good luck with that. Dude’s in the wind and we ain’t heard a peep. He’s like a ninja.”

It comes out heavier than he means it. Already, he’s trying to gauge the strength of the Mark—how hot it burns in him, how loud its voice sounds inside his skull. How likely he is to smash Sam’s face into a wall before Cas finds anything. 

Thinking about it feels like having his insides scooped out, like the rest of him might just collapse in on itself. Like there’s a black hole at his heart.

“I have to try,” Cas says. He reaches out, and Dean half-expects to find himself pulled into a hug. That’s a thing Cas does now; hugs people goodbye. Dean would like to believe it’s just a habit he’s picked up from hanging out with humans too long, but—Cas understands things now. 

Things like how it feels to fear you’ll never see somebody again every time you say goodbye.

Cas doesn’t go for the hug, though. He just grasps Dean’s arm, his brow furrowed in that intense, careful expression he always gets when he does this.

Dean doesn’t feel it like a wave, this time. Slow, cold threads of grace working their way into him. More like a dose of Tylenol than a knock-out anesthetic.

Maybe Cas is conserving energy. He needs to, after all. 

That thought should be enough to make Dean push him away, say thanks, but that’s enough. 

He doesn’t. He closes his eyes, feels it—Cas—shining in his veins. The quiet that follows.

Cas’s hand stays on his arm for a moment after he’s done. Then it’s gone, and when Dean opens his eyes, he’s just in time to see the front door closing.

 

\----

 

Dean gets back to it. Shuts himself up in his room and surrounds himself with piles of books, like he can just bury the Mark and everything that goes with it under words. 

That’s what he’s doing. Hiding. He’s starting to see that, now. He’s been over all the available lore enough times that he knows he isn’t looking for anything anymore. Not really.

Sam leaves him be for two more days. Then he knocks on Dean’s bedroom door and drags him out of there and back on the road—and yeah, it’s actually okay. Dean can stop thinking about the Mark every damn second of every damn day. He can stop imagining an answer will magically appear every time he turns the page.

And then—well.

Then, Dean’s a fucking fourteen-year-old, suddenly scarless and new for the second time in his life. Coincidence, or fate, or whatever the hell you wanna call it, turns over a new page for him, and he rips it up without a second thought.

It wasn’t him, he tells himself, as they drive away. He doesn’t have it in him to walk around looking like a kid who might grow up good one day, who’s never been touched by hell. 

Besides, didn’t Cas say the Mark was more than a physical thing? Dean’s soul is as old as it’s ever been, and he knows there’s no such thing as a free lunch. Free adolescence, whatever. It’d bite him in the ass sooner or later. That’s how it works.

And then a couple weeks later he’s sitting in a college dorm, giving this kid the whole spiel about how she can’t run away from her wrongs, can’t take them back. 

It feels like a weight off of his shoulders as he says it. 

He can’t go back. He knows it, and hey, this might be the first time he’s actually gotten to shake hands with the final stage of grief. He’s just gotta accept it. Keep it under control. All he can do.

Maybe Sammy and Cas will even figure that out sometime soon.

Sam’s face, when Dean tells him, suggests he isn’t anywhere close just yet. He gets up a half-assed protest when Dean tells him, but then he just shakes his head and closes his eyes, like he’s too tired to fight it out. Dean remembers that look. Doesn’t mean he’s giving up; just means he’s giving up on telling Dean about it.

They drive back to the bunker in silence.

 

\----

 

This time, Cas doesn’t knock gently at the door. It flies open while Dean’s in the middle of dismantling the impromptu research fort that somehow built up around him on the floor, and sends a fistful of papers fluttering out of his grip.

He stoops to gather them, scowling. Grits his teeth to ignore the irritation that’s starting to itch beneath his skin. “What the hell, Cas?”

Cas doesn’t answer, just pushes forward into his space.

“What?” Dean says, again.

“Sam called me.” Cas is staring at him. Staring _into_ him, eyes wide and accusing. “You’re giving up.”

That was what Sam called it, too. Neither of them fucking gets it.

Dean takes a breath that catches in his throat. He can do this. Hold it together long enough to make Cas understand. Make him see that he can’t fix this, but he can help.

He shrugs. “I’m being realistic. Hell, one of us has to.”

A muscle twitches in Cas’s jaw. “That isn’t true. You know it isn’t.” 

“Bullshit.” Dean sighs and drops the stack of books he’s holding onto the bed. He makes for the door, but Cas sidesteps so he’s standing in Dean’s way. Just standing there, arms hanging at his sides, but still immovable as a brick wall.

Dean stops, crosses his arms. Resentment is starting to flare up in him, now, burning at the base of his skull. 

“What you gonna do?” he snaps. “Beat the crap out of me like you did the last time you didn’t like how I was dealing? ‘Cause that worked so well.”

Cas stiffens visibly, and Dean knows he’s hit home. There’s a dark satisfaction curled around the thought.

But Cas doesn’t rise to the bait. “No,” he says, and for all the desperation on his face his voice is dead calm. “But I am cutting you off.”

It takes Dean a second to get a hold of what he means. He stares. “What, so if I don’t do things your way, you’re not gonna help at all? Nice, Cas. Real nice.”

Cas’s mouth does this thing, the mutinous expression he gets when he thinks Dean’s being a stupid asshole and he’s on the verge of zapping out the room. 

Only Cas can’t zap anymore, so he stands his ground and says, “I’ve been searching for an answer for weeks, Dean. I don’t just want to _help_ , I want—” 

He breaks off, pinches the bridge of his nose, and he looks so fucking tired. So faded that Dean suddenly wants to reach out and grab his arm just to make sure he’s real. 

He doesn’t. 

Cas looks up at him, then. “I thought I was helping,” he says. “I came here and you were so afraid. You were afraid of yourself.” 

He squeezes his eyes shut, like the thought causes him physical pain, and Dean’s reminded that, yeah, Cas knows how that is. He knows exactly how that is.

Then he opens them, and goes on, “But if fear was the only thing that kept you fighting? I can’t take that away from you, Dean. I won’t.” There’s sorrow in his voice.

Thing is, Cas is probably right. Treating something that can swallow up a soul and spit it back out as demon smoke like it’s a busted knee to be managed with painkillers? That’s the opposite of dealing. It’s just that knowing that doesn’t mean Dean has any answers.

He sighs, feeling that weight settle back into its place on his shoulders. Turns away from Cas.

“Fine,” he says. “You can go.”

“What?”

“Go. Get back in your car, go back to looking for Cain or whatever the hell you’re doing out there. I get it.”

“Dean.” He feels Cas’s hand on his shoulder. Turns back, despite everything. Cas’s eyes are dark, sad. Steady. “I will,” Cas tells him. “But—not right now.”

His hand moves to Dean’s face, cups his cheek. Cas’s palm is warm. There’s no tingle of grace. It’s just like a human touch.

“Cas.” Dean swallows. “What are you doing?”

“I said I was cutting you off,” Cas says. “Not leaving you alone.” His thumb brushes Dean’s cheekbone. Dean feels the hesitation in the gesture, how careful it is.

“You don’t—” he begins. Pauses. “You don’t have to.”

Cas just moves forward. He was already up in Dean’s space, and now they’re breathing the same air and Dean can see the faint creases under Cas’s eyes. Cas backs him up until his legs meet the bed and he stops, palms to Cas’s chest.

“All the things you taught me,” Cas says, then. “All the things you said about how we don’t give up on family.” His voice is rough. Dean feels it in his bones. “Don’t make them into lies. _Don’t_.”

Dean shudders. Turns his face into Cas’s palm and doesn’t know if he’s chasing warmth or something else. It’s all the answer he’s got.

Apparently it’s enough for Cas, because this brief shadow of hesitation crosses his face, and then he leans in closer still and fits his mouth to Dean’s. 

Dean startles, just for a second, his heart suspended in midair, because even though he was kind of expecting this, he kind of wasn’t.

Then—then, he closes his eyes, and he lets it happen.

He sits down hard on the edge of the bed, narrowly misses the pile of books, and then Cas’s weight is on him. Cas straddles his hips, holds his face in both hands, doesn’t let him look away. More desperation in those hands than in anything Cas could’ve said.

Cas kisses him rough and hungry, teeth scraping at his jaw and his neck, leaving their presence behind like a heat trail when Cas turns his attention to unbuttoning Dean’s shirt.

This feeling—it doesn’t dull the Mark, the way Cas’s grace did. But maybe it drowns it out a little. Maybe it’s something Dean would rather listen to. Maybe now, just for a few minutes, he can let himself.

They don’t even get all of the way out of their clothes before Cas’s hand is on him. He gets Dean’s dick out of his pants and shoves him back into the mattress and strokes them both together, slick with sweat and spit. It’s all urgency, no technique, his breaths a sharp staccato in Dean’s ear. It’s like he’s trying to make a point, and probably he is, but somehow Dean can’t manage to be pissed about it. 

Or if he is pissed, he can’t get a hold of the feeling, because then he’s coming all over Cas’s hand and the front of his shirt with a sigh that sounds like relief, and Cas is kissing his mouth, kissing his eyelids, kissing him all over his face, and Dean’s still letting it happen.

And when Cas peels himself away, Dean catches his hand and pulls him back. Meets his eyes and can’t say anything for a moment.

He swallows. “Thought you were staying,” he gets out.

He can’t read the expression that crosses Cas’s face. But then Cas makes squinty-eyes at the pile of books like it’s personally offended him and shoves it off the mattress onto the floor, and sinks back into the bed and Dean’s side.

 

\----

 

Dean doesn’t really expect to sleep, but eventually he does. 

Surprise number two is that Cas is still there when he wakes up. Dean blinks at him, bleary-eyed, as the memories of last night make their way back to him in bits and pieces. He looks for the regret under it all, but can’t find it. Not right now.

Cas’s eyes are closed, and Dean can hear his even breathing. He looks for all the world like he’s sleeping.

Dean wonders how much angel he even is anymore. How much of his refusal to help was just that he couldn’t, didn’t have the juice.

Right now, Dean’s too fuzzy to remember his dreams, though when they come back, he knows they won’t be pretty. He can feel the darkness pressing in at the sides of his mind, all ready with a full-color blood-and-guts slideshow. He can feel the Mark, burning like a brand in the darkness, faint but getting brighter. He can hear it whispering beneath the surface of his thoughts.

He looks down at his hands. They’re trembling, just a little.

Cas doesn’t say anything, doesn’t even open his eyes. He reaches up and takes Dean’s right hand, folds it in both of his own. Pulls it to his chest and holds it there, right over his heart. Dean can feel it beating in there beneath his ribcage, and it’s so nearly human, so nearly breakable, that it scares the crap out of him.

But Cas just holds on tight. His hands are strong, steady. Not going anywhere.

Dean closes his eyes.


End file.
